SOUTH BEND, Ind. (WNDU) One of the areas largest employers and biggest businesses is back in business.
The Four Winds Casino in South Bend reopened this morning.
There was no long line of people waiting to get in and that was by design.
Doors that were supposed to open at noon were instead opened at 10:00 a.m. so people could safely trickle-in instead of crowding the entrance.
At that entrance, temperatures were checked, and masks were handed out to those who didn’t bring one.
Despite all the concerns over safety -senses of humor seemed to survive.
Susie Warwick of Logansport was wearing a t-shirt that read, “Straight Out Of Quarantine, waitress 2020. “
She’s a waitress at Pizza Hut and Bob Evans who spent 12 weeks on the sidelines.
“I’m coming back to the casino because this is what I like to do,” she said. “Very long 11 weeks, I’m a people person and I miss, I miss talking to people. I’m a hugger too, I miss hugging people.”
Susie brought a friend who has spent much of her time on the front lines.
“I worked every day of the pandemic, never, never took time off and I have been working for GM in Kokomo making ventilators for the hospitals and FEMA,” said Christa Rosier of Logansport.
After the principles of social distancing were applied, about 800 of the 1,400 slot machines here were in play.
The poker room will remain closed until further notice.
Michael Stann came from Elkhart to try his luck. “Well you know I been cooped up about three or four months and I just thought I’d come here and see what was going on and you know donate a few dollars.”
Something a lot of people like to do is something they can do again, while one of the areas largest employers can get people back to work.
“For a month the owners allowed us to continue to pay all the employees . For a month even after being closed,” said Four Winds COO Frank Freedman. “You know we have over a thousand employees that have been with us for ten years or more and in our business that’s a big statement.”
The next thing set to restart at the South Bend Four Winds will be the construction of a 23 story hotel.
The health crisis made it difficult to get materials to the construction site.
According to The Tribal Chairman of the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians, “Hotel construction obviously slowed down quite a bit when the covid hit. Through some of the executive orders there were some restrictions on deliveries, materials, that kind of stuff. We have the pilings completed so once we can get kind of everybody back, get some material in, the timeline is still the same, two years, but obviously that’ll be extended out a couple months because of the delays. It’s been minimal work so far. We’re anxious to get that up and running again.
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June 16, 2020 at 04:24AM
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The Four Winds Casino reopens Monday - WNDU-TV
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